Balanced steady-state free-precession (bSSFP) is a popular magnetic resonance (MR) imaging technique (e.g., cardiac imaging, angiography) due to its high signal, speed and desirable flow properties. In bSSFP, a lot of research has been devoted to catalyzation and the steady state. Catalyzation in bSSFP includes one or more dummy RF acquisitions, which are applied before image acquisition. There are two primary reasons for catalyzing the magnetization to the steady state, which are to reduce signal oscillations and to achieve a level signal intensity to during acquisition. However, in many cases, acquisition is intermittent due to timing constraints of physiological gating or use of contrast preparation mechanisms. As a result, the steady state is never reached and acquisition only occurs in the transient stage. The acquisition is referred to as being broken up into “acquisition blocks”. In certain cases, full (or equilibrium) magnetization is present at the start of each acquisition block, e.g., inflow-based angiography, allowing for increased signal in the image. The present invention focuses on techniques to increase the overall signal in a transient bSSFP acquisition by fully or better utilizing the magnetization, rather than allowing the magnetization to approach steady state.